Midlake kicked it off with their splashy tunes, at times, punchy enough to make crushes swoon. And these guys have more instrumentation per capita than any band I’ve ever seen. The stage looked like a NASA control center. Their sober melodies and pinching innocence were the solid foundation of a long night of action.

Cold War Kids, whose hype most of the kids showed up for, were next and delivered a bustling, frantic set full of fine indie shrieking. They splashed the crowd with jangling mojo and there were slight moments of brilliance, but overall, the scales weren’t tipped. Then half the peeps filed out.

Finally came the saucy posse, SOUND Team. On a side note, a friend brought me a shirt she designed and out front the show, the ST bassist caught a glimpse and beseeched her to borrow it. Thinking he was in a band @ the Middle East, she declined, but after much pursuit of said shirt, I gave him the OK to rock it on stage, which he completely did. The shirt’s covered in awesome images of various meat products, and was even mentioned before the start of a new song of theirs as a possible title, “Meat Carpet”. Anyway, the dudes pounded through their set with Texas-sized swagger - popped it and locked it, like a freight train bouncing down the tracks. Solid as hell.

My Youtube clip of “No More Birthdays”
My Youtube clip of “Back In Town”
One more coming…

Related: Cold War Kids’ tour diary